‘HOMICIDE” creators Barry Levinson and Tom Fontana have cried foul and slapped NBC with a lawsuit.

The suit, filed this week in Los Angeles Superior Court, accuses the network of fraud and breach of contract for the way NBC handled the 1994 syndication sales for their much-lauded drama series “Homicide: Life on the Street.”

The show, which NBC yanked last spring after six seasons, was initially sold to Lifetime, but currently airs weeknights on Court TV.

The lawsuit however, is one of many similar cases headed for court that have stemmed from the entertainment industry’s continued consolidation.

Generally, the people involved in the creation of TV shows have been complaining that studios tend to offer better deals to the networks or cable stations that are part of the same company, rather than let competing TV networks pay more for the rights.

Fontanta could not be reached for comment yesterday because he was in Miami, shooting the pilot for — ironically — an NBC crime show, “Good Guys.”

NBC says it plans to fight the lawsuit.

“We don’t believe that the allegations have merit,” said NBC spokeswoman Shirley Powell in a prepared statement.

The “Homicide” lawsuit is similar to a growing number of other lawsuits of a type that seem to be getting more popular in the television industry.

Last year, “X-Files” star David Duchovny sued 20th Century Fox Television and producer Chris Carter for allegedly cheating him out of the show’s licensing fees when the studio undersold “X-Files” repeats at bargain-basement prices to Fox affiliates and cable stations.

Meanwhile, “NYPD Blue” creator Steven Bochco is also suing Fox for allegedly self-dealing “Blue” to FX for $400,000 an episode.

In contrast, “ER” sold for $1.2 million an episode to TNT, after Lifetime, the USA Network and TNT got into a bidding war for the Warner Bros.-owned show.